cable or wireless to router

[Fishtales]

That isn't the speed of the connection though Fred. The dropped packets and re-tries are down to what is between the computer and the transmitter. Having it tucked away in a corner surrounded by books or furniture wont do it any good and the number of walls it has to go through between the two slows it down too. Hard wire can be slow too if you happen to be connected to a node where another half a dozen users are downloading movies or watching YouTube all at the same time. It even happens with my Virgin broadband at times. The point I was making was that Wi-fi and wired are equally as fast but either can be affected by other outside influences.  If you are on an 8 Mbps line you wont get it any higher using a 1 Gbps card in the computer, an 85 Mbps mains adaptor or the 300 Mbps wi-fi I am getting on my laptop. The computer also plays a part if it has a slow processor or is low on memory there will be a speed difference between computers on the same network. I see this all the time between the main computer that is hard wired and the laptop which is wi-fi. The laptop can be faster than the main computer because it has a better processor. Connecting the two directly and the transfer flies but it is still slowed by the slowest connection. Hard wired through the mains adaptor is slower than through wi-fi because the mains adaptor is 85 Mbps and the wi-fi on the laptop is 300 Mbps even although the main computer is 1 Gbps.

[Wildfisher]

That isn't the speed of the connection though Fred.

It is if you consider you connection  to be the entire path  from your computer outwards.  Fact is a cable is less likely  to cause a problem than WIFI. I had exactly this problem recently. It was intermittent and impossible to determine by anything except substitution. I was just puttng it down to my broadband and I'm certain that most people will just assume the same. If you are having problems hard wire it before you call your ISP  because if an engineer is sent out and it proves to be an internal problem with your computer's WIFI adapter,  as it was with mine, you are going to be billed for his time.

[Fishtales]

Someone posted that hard wire is faster than wi-fi and I was pointing out it wasn't. I agree wi-fi isn't as stable but that wasn't what I was answering. In some instances wi-fi could be faster. If the card that is hard wired is only 100 Mbps then my wi-fi at 300 Mbps is faster. They will still only download at 60 Mbps as that is the speed of the line coming into the router from Virgin. If they put me up to the 100 Mbps level then the wi-fi will be faster because the 100 Mbps card wont download at its maximum whereas the wi-fi will still have bandwidth to spare. When I hard wire my laptop into the mains adaptor  in the conservatory it slows down because it is only 85 Mbps but it is better because the wi-fi is weak out there and can be as low as 50 Mbps because it has a couple of walls and a floor to get through which degrades the signal. I used to have a mains wi-fi extender which meant I could work out in the garden too but I gave it to my daughter as she doesn't have a wi-fi router and she can now use the laptops and tablets in any room in her house. It too was only 85 Mbps and I could tell the difference between connecting to it and directly with the wi-fi on the router which was 300 Mbps. Comparing speeds and connectivity are two different things although the latter impacts on the former

[scobo]

You can also use an old/spare router as a wifi extender. I have one set up to cover a flat spot upstairs.
Takes a bit of configuring but there are guides online.

[Yardbent]

well i've not had a single instance of a lost connection since adding the cable

well pleased

[Wildfisher]

There was  a serious local issue here yesterday evening with the broadband. At about 7.00PM my download speed dropped under 400  bits / second and stayed like that until at least midnight. It was like being back in Aberdeenshire.  :lol:

It was fine this morning. The phone lines were also hissing with white noise. Looks like there was some kind of line / exchange issue.

[Inchlaggan]

 7pm Broadband dip- Punters watching the Olympics catch-up on Iplayer?